Dataset Information

The whole genome sequence of the Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis capitata (Wiedemann), reveals insights into the biology and adaptive evolution of a highly invasive pest species.

ABSTRACT: The Mediterranean fruit fly (medfly), Ceratitis capitata, is a major destructive insect pest due to its broad host range, which includes hundreds of fruits and vegetables. It exhibits a unique ability to invade and adapt to ecological niches throughout tropical and subtropical regions of the world, though medfly infestations have been prevented and controlled by the sterile insect technique (SIT) as part of integrated pest management programs (IPMs). The genetic analysis and manipulation of medfly has been subject to intensive study in an effort to improve SIT efficacy and other aspects of IPM control.The 479 Mb medfly genome is sequenced from adult flies from lines inbred for 20 generations. A high-quality assembly is achieved having a contig N50 of 45.7 kb and scaffold N50 of 4.06 Mb. In-depth curation of more than 1800 messenger RNAs shows specific gene expansions that can be related to invasiveness and host adaptation, including gene families for chemoreception, toxin and insecticide metabolism, cuticle proteins, opsins, and aquaporins. We identify genes relevant to IPM control, including those required to improve SIT.The medfly genome sequence provides critical insights into the biology of one of the most serious and widespread agricultural pests. This knowledge should significantly advance the means of controlling the size and invasive potential of medfly populations. Its close relationship to Drosophila, and other insect species important to agriculture and human health, will further comparative functional and structural studies of insect genomes that should broaden our understanding of gene family evolution.

SUBMITTER: Papanicolaou A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5034548 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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The whole genome sequence of the Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis capitata (Wiedemann), reveals insights into the biology and adaptive evolution of a highly invasive pest species.

Papanicolaou Alexie A Schetelig Marc F MF Arensburger Peter P Atkinson Peter W PW Benoit Joshua B JB Bourtzis Kostas K Castañera Pedro P Cavanaugh John P JP Chao Hsu H Childers Christopher C Curril Ingrid I Dinh Huyen H Doddapaneni HarshaVardhan H Dolan Amanda A Dugan Shannon S Friedrich Markus M Gasperi Giuliano G Geib Scott S Georgakilas Georgios G Gibbs Richard A RA Giers Sarah D SD Gomulski Ludvik M LM González-Guzmán Miguel M Guillem-Amat Ana A Han Yi Y Hatzigeorgiou Artemis G AG Hernández-Crespo Pedro P Hughes Daniel S T DS Jones Jeffery W JW Karagkouni Dimitra D Koskinioti Panagiota P Lee Sandra L SL Malacrida Anna R AR Manni Mosè M Mathiopoulos Kostas K Meccariello Angela A Munoz-Torres Monica Murali Shwetha C SC Murphy Terence D TD Muzny Donna M DM Oberhofer Georg G Ortego Félix F Paraskevopoulou Maria D MD Poelchau Monica M Qu Jiaxin J Reczko Martin M Robertson Hugh M HM Rosendale Andrew J AJ Rosselot Andrew E AE Saccone Giuseppe G Saccone Giuseppe G Salvemini Marco M Savini Grazia G Schreiner Patrick P Schreiner Patrick P Scolari Francesca F Siciliano Paolo P Sim Sheina B SB Tsiamis George G Ureña Enric E Vlachos Ioannis S IS Werren John H JH Wimmer Ernst A EA Worley Kim C KC Zacharopoulou Antigone A Richards Stephen S Handler Alfred M AM

Genome biology 20160922 1

<h4>Background</h4>The Mediterranean fruit fly (medfly), Ceratitis capitata, is a major destructive insect pest due to its broad host range, which includes hundreds of fruits and vegetables. It exhibits a unique ability to invade and adapt to ecological niches throughout tropical and subtropical regions of the world, though medfly infestations have been prevented and controlled by the sterile insect technique (SIT) as part of integrated pest management programs (IPMs). The genetic analysis and m ...[more]

PMID: 27659211

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Project description:BackgroundThe medfly, Ceratitis capitata, is a highly invasive agricultural pest that has become a model insect for the development of biological control programs. Despite research into the behavior and classical and population genetics of this organism, the quantity of sequence data available is limited. We have utilized an expressed sequence tag (EST) approach to obtain detailed information on transcriptome signatures that relate to a variety of physiological systems in the medfly; this information emphasizes on reproduction, sex determination, and chemosensory perception, since the study was based on normalized cDNA libraries from embryos and adult heads.ResultsA total of 21,253 high-quality ESTs were obtained from the embryo and head libraries. Clustering analyses performed separately for each library resulted in 5201 embryo and 6684 head transcripts. Considering an estimated 19% overlap in the transcriptomes of the two libraries, they represent about 9614 unique transcripts involved in a wide range of biological processes and molecular functions. Of particular interest are the sequences that share homology with Drosophila genes involved in sex determination, olfaction, and reproductive behavior. The medfly transformer2 (tra2) homolog was identified among the embryonic sequences, and its genomic organization and expression were characterized.ConclusionThe sequences obtained in this study represent the first major dataset of expressed genes in a tephritid species of agricultural importance. This resource provides essential information to support the investigation of numerous questions regarding the biology of the medfly and other related species and also constitutes an invaluable tool for the annotation of complete genome sequences. Our study has revealed intriguing findings regarding the transcript regulation of tra2 and other sex determination genes, as well as insights into the comparative genomics of genes implicated in chemosensory reception and reproduction.

Project description:The Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis capitata (medfly), is an extremely invasive agricultural pest due to its extremely wide host range and its ability to adapt to a broad range of climatic conditions and habitats. Chemosensory behaviour plays an important role in many crucial stages in the life of this insect, such as the detection of pheromone cues during mate pursuit and odorants during host plant localisation. Thus, the analysis of the chemosensory gene repertoire is an important step for the interpretation of the biology of this species and consequently its invasive potential. Moreover, these genes may represent ideal targets for the development of novel, effective control methods and pest population monitoring systems. Expressed sequence tag libraries from C. capitata adult heads, embryos, male accessory glands and testes were screened for sequences encoding putative odorant binding proteins (OBPs). A total of seventeen putative OBP transcripts were identified, corresponding to 13 Classic, three Minus-C and one Plus-C subfamily OBPs. The tissue distributions of the OBP transcripts were assessed by RT-PCR and a subset of five genes with predicted proteins sharing high sequence similarities and close phylogenetic affinities to Drosophila melanogaster pheromone binding protein related proteins (PBPRPs) were characterised in greater detail. Real Time quantitative PCR was used to assess the effects of maturation, mating and time of day on the transcript abundances of the putative PBPRP genes in the principal olfactory organs, the antennae, in males and females. The results of the present study have facilitated the annotation of OBP genes in the recently released medfly genome sequence and represent a significant contribution to the characterisation of the medfly chemosensory repertoire. The identification of these medfly OBPs/PBPRPs permitted evolutionary and functional comparisons with homologous sequences from other tephritids of the genera Bactrocera and Rhagoletis.

Project description:BACKGROUND: In embryos the maternal-to-zygotic transition (MTZ) integrates post-transcriptional regulation of maternal transcripts with transcriptional activation of the zygotic genome. Although the molecular mechanisms underlying this event are being clarified in Drosophila melanogaster, little is know about the embryogenic processes in other insect species. The recent publication of expressed sequence tags (ESTs) from embryos of the global pest species Ceratitis capitata (medfly) has enabled the investigation of embryogenesis in this species and has allowed a comparison of the embryogenic processes in these two related dipteran species, C. capitata and D. melanogaster, that shared a common ancestor 80-100 mya. RESULTS: Using a novel PCR-based sexing method, which takes advantage of a putative LTR retrotransposon MITE insertion on the medfly Y chromosome, the transcriptomes of individual early male and female embryos were analysed using RT-PCR. This study is focused on two crucial aspects of the onset of embryonic development: sex determination and cellular blastoderm formation. Together with the three known medfly genes (Cctransformer, Cctransformer2 and Ccdoublesex), the expression patterns of other medfly genes that are similar to the D. melanogaster sex-determination genes (sisterlessA, groucho, deadpan, Sex-lethal, female lethal d, sans fille and intersex) and four cellular blastoderm formation genes (Rho1, spaghetti squash, slow-as-molasses and serendipity-alpha) were analyzed, allowing us to sketch a preliminary outline of the embryonic process in the medfly. Furthermore, a putative homologue of the Zelda gene has been considered, which in D. melanogaster encodes a DNA-binding factor responsible for the maternal-to-zygotic transition. CONCLUSIONS: Our novel sexing method facilitates the study of i) when the MTZ transition occurs in males and females of C. capitata, ii) when and how the maternal information of "female-development" is reprogrammed in the embryos and iii) similarities and differences in the regulation of gene expression in C. capitata and D. melanogaster. We suggest a new model for the onset of the sex determination cascade in the medfly: the maternally inherited Cctra transcripts in the female embryos are insufficient to produce enough active protein to inhibit the male mode of Cctra splicing. The slow rate of development and the inefficiency of the splicing mechanism in the pre-cellular blastoderm facilitates the male-determining factor (M) activity, which probably acts by inhibiting CcTRA protein activity.

Dataset Information

The whole genome sequence of the Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis capitata (Wiedemann), reveals insights into the biology and adaptive evolution of a highly invasive pest species.

Publications

The whole genome sequence of the Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis capitata (Wiedemann), reveals insights into the biology and adaptive evolution of a highly invasive pest species.

Similar Datasets

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